Misplaced
by eclaire291
Summary: With Nibelheim burning behind his eyes, he can't quite find an answer when she says, "I promised to write to him. Can I give you the letters?"
**Title** : Misplaced
 **Characters/Pairings** : Tseng and Aerith  
 **Musical inspiration** : "Bloodstream" (acoustic version) by Stateless  
 **Notes** : It is really difficult to get Aerith's characterization right; she's innocent and sweet in most instances but there's a sort of underlying harshness. This is seen in FFVII when she comes across a wounded Tseng at the Temple of the Ancients and berates him instead of making any move to assist him. There might be more chapters added to this later since I'd like to expand on the moment when Zack actually does die, Aerith's last meeting with Tseng, and the eventual fate of those 88 letters.

* * *

 **Misplaced**

 _The trees are ablaze._

That's how the conversation begins as he holds out a burnt orange maple leaf.

The color should be beautiful. However, he can't help but think of Nibelheim, the same burnt orange burning the image in his mind as flames engulfed the town. Everything was still smoldering, hours after the Shinra cleanup crew had been deployed to deal with the situation. An unbidden sense of relief had filled his chest when he found the boy, unconscious and injured but alive nonetheless, at the Nibel Reactor. But then Veld was at his elbow, informing him of what Hojo had planned.

He can't shake that from his mind as he stands before Aerith Gainsborough, who is smiling and innocent and full of life. September is coming to an end, and Aerith always did like to hear when the leaves started changing for autumn above the plate. She takes the leaf and spins the stem between her fingers with a small smile. She sets it aside as she continues freeing the stargazer lilies from the grip of the few weeds that managed to sneak into the flowerbed. September 22, Tseng reminds himself, almost choking on the memory of ash and smoke. He struggles for the words. He never was very good at finding the right ones. Zack's dead. _Zack Fair, SOLDIER First Class, is dead._ He says it, slow and even, as the words buzz in his head.

Aerith pauses in her work. Dirt falls between her fingers as she stands up, leaning forward slightly as she peers at him.

"Oh," she says, her voice subdued. A slight pause falls between them. Then, the usual cheeriness returns as she asks, "Can you pass me the watering can?"

Numbed by her lack of reaction, Tseng wordlessly hands her the watering can. He isn't sure what he expected. For her to tear up and rush into his arms? Maybe in the back of his mind he had hoped for that, and the recognition makes him feel ill. Though, realistically, he had thought she would do or say something more than a blasé "oh." She seems to sense his surprise and turns to him again. Most days they miss each other's gazes, Tseng always looks away before he can meet her eyes. It's easier that way because he suspects she can see straight through him, into him. He's afraid of what those eyes might drag out of him. Now, when their eyes meet, that feeling creeps in. A soft smile tugs at her mouth as she wipes her hands on her dress, dirt smearing over the pale blue and white material.

"You're not very good at lying," she says.

A good many people could dispute that observation. Tseng makes his living lying, and he is good at it. It is a rarer occasion when he speaks the truth fully, but he says none of this to Aerith. She is different than Rufus or the Turks or the others with which he interacts. He knows she isn't merely feigning awareness of the true situation. She is, after all, the last Cetra. He often feels she knows more than she let on.

He's alive, Tseng could say. But that would be as much of a lie as telling her of his death. Could he really claim that living in a test tube in Hojo's lab was living? How long of a life expectancy did the boy have, anyway? Perhaps in a few weeks or so, the experiments would fail and then Tseng's earlier words would become true. Either way, the boy was never going to return to her. The sudden clench of grief in his chest takes him by surprise. He is brought out of his musings by a hand suddenly placed on his arm, the weight warm and soothing. For the second time today, he meets her emerald-green gaze, full of insight and compassion.

He doesn't deserve her.

That realization is nothing new. He's known that since the first day he met her. He feels the need to remind himself from time to time, though.

What happened to Zack? Is he on a mission? When will he come back? All these things Aerith could ask of Tseng, but they both know it would amount to nothing. Tseng cannot even entertain the possibility of betraying Shinra. Even now, after everything that happened. And Aerith knows better. So, instead she gives his arm a reassuring pat — comforting him when it should be the other way around. But it isn't unexpected. This is the girl who hadn't even been fazed by a dark-haired, hyperactive boy falling from the sky into her garden, after all.

"We're friends, right?" she asks, the question completely throwing him off guard.

A bitter laugh nearly escapes him. He won't lie to her a second time, so he stays silent. She doesn't seem bothered by his lack of response. Though, he knows she doesn't consider him a friend, either. They're merely constants in each other's life. Absently, she frets with her braid, her fingers smoothing over the pink ribbon tying her hair back. He follows the gesture, a frown pulling at his lips as he recognizes the ribbon — Zack's gift to her.

"I promised to write to him," she says finally. "Can I give you the letters?"

The floorboards creak slightly as she crosses to the overturned crate near the garden. She retrieves a sealed envelope from where it had been weighted under a garden trowel. She holds the envelope out to him. He considers it, what it means if he takes the letter.

 _Zack is dead._

He repeats those words, quelling any emotion. There's disappointment in her eyes. She slowly lowers her arm. A slight sigh and then she turns away. He's turning, too. He can hear the slosh of water as she picks up the watering can once again and resumes her gardening. He leaves the church.

It's years before he next speaks with her.

On the days he's tasked with watching over the Ancient, he stays out of sight instead of entering the church and sitting in one of the old church pews as he had once done. One day when he's crouched on the rafters, he prepares to leave the church to keep an eye on Aerith as she heads into market to sell flowers. He waits until she leaves first and then gives the church a last glance. He's about to leave when catches sight of an envelope sitting on the overturned crate, the same envelope that she had tried to give to him weeks earlier. Carefully making his way from the rafters to the ground, he approaches the crate and notices the stamp and mailing address now scrawled across it — the last address Zack had given Aerith when he had been stationed in Nibelheim.

He wonders how much she knows about Zack's true fate.

That same heavy guilt he usually refuses to admit to settles in his chest. He picks up the envelope and tucks it into the pocket of his jacket.

A few days pass before he is once again sent to the church. He watches, unseen, as Aerith hums to herself and fixes the wheel on her flower cart. She doesn't seem to care that her letter is missing. She knows Tseng took it, though. He comes to this realization a few weeks later when yet another envelope — stamped and addressed — is placed on the crate as she prepares to leave for the market. He takes the letter and later places it in his desk drawer at work with the previous letter. It continues for four years, the pretense of carelessly mislaid letters.

He'll keep them. One day, he hopes Zack will be able to read them.


End file.
